


Isolation (is not good for me)

by flashwitch



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Crew as Family, Depression, Gen, Mental Health Issues, PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-24
Updated: 2017-11-24
Packaged: 2019-02-06 11:00:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12816087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashwitch/pseuds/flashwitch
Summary: After they win there is a party.After the party there is nothing.Taako struggles with depression following everything.





	1. Chapter 1

The thing is, everyone expects him to forgive her. Or not forgive her, but in that moment, that moment of relief, of exhilaration, of jigsaw pieces slotting back into place, they expect him to be swept up in it. They expect him to fall into the hug and let that feeling of family, of _crew_ , wash over him, the way the others all were.

And fine. That would be nice. He has missed these fools, even if he didn’t, you know, _know_ he missed them.

But that’s not him. That’s never been him. He has always been the pragmatic one. The cold one. His Aunt -their Aunt- used to say that between the two of them they made one whole person.

 Lup was the one with the heart. She was the one who thought about other people. She was the one who… He wasn’t like her. He was the one who did what needed to be done. He was the one who made the hard decision. He never thought about anyone but the two of them, because that was all that mattered. That he was ok and so was Lup.

That they were together.

He’s not the emotional one. So when Magnus gestures him over, tries to get him to join in with the big group hug, he almost laughs. Because no. That’s not Taako; Taako’s good out here. He doesn’t need to be dragged in to the big emotional revelation. He doesn’t act on feelings, he’s not emotional. And the idea of letting himself feel this is… it’s ridiculous. He doesn’t have a heart. Lucretia ripped it right out of him, along with his memories. And yes, he got Lup back, she’s here and she’s real, but he can’t hug her. And he could have lost her! Forever.

If he hadn’t picked up that damn umbrella…

(Picked it up from his sister’s _corpse,_ oh yeah, thanks Lucretia!)

If he hadn’t thought to break it…

He doesn’t want this.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s already too late, of course.

He’s in it too deep with all of these idiots. Lup… is Lup. Merle, Magnus, Barry, they were a given after the last few… months? Adventures? Whatever. And as soon as he remembered Cap’nport, he couldn’t just not feel anything for him. The gnome had been an excellent captain, and just an all around good person. He always put the crew first.

And as Taako’s thinking about it, he’s appalled to realise that while he wasn’t looking more people have joined his list of ‘crew’. Cary. Killian. N03113. Ango.

Kravitz.

Later that day, when the shouting was over and they were all sitting in the Bureau Bar and he had had several very strong drinks (always careful to keep Lup in sight), he forced his thoughts towards Lucretia.

One half of him thinks _Madame Director_. One half of him thinks _Little Lucretia._ One half of him just screams anger and hatred and despair and loss. All the grieving he never got to do.

Wait. That’s too many halves. He looks at the faintly glowing liquid in the glass Merle had shoved into his hand and wonders if he should slow down.

He doesn’t.

Gods, she’d taken everything from him.

Kravitz is looking at him. He looks worried.

Taako swallows down his drink and buries his face in his arms.

Thing is, none of them get it. Outside of the crew, Lucretia is a hero. They’re all heroes. Outside of the crew, everyone just thinks they saved the world together.

And inside of the crew, they all have this history, this love for Lucretia. Even him. It’s still there, tarnished and blackened and small. But it’s still there. As much as he hates to admit it. Emotions are Lup’s thing. He’s not supposed to feel like this. He’s supposed to be the sensible one.

All of the crew lost something because of her. But they all _understand_. They know the horror which drove her too it.

So they don’t understand. Or they understand her and not him. What he lost was so much more. They lost memories. He lost his other half.

He lost his heart.

For years he has been cold and calculating and pragmatic with no one to balance him out. And he hates that about himself, that without Lup there to remind him he forgets that other people matter. And ok, maybe he’s thawed a little since meeting up with the boys and everything, but that’s not the point.

There’s a hand on his arm. It’s cold and large enough to wrap all the way around his forearm. He knows it’s Kravitz and part of him (the Lup part) wants to just turn to him and bury himself in his boyfriend’s arms. But he can’t. He feels… disconnected.

He doesn’t remember much more of that night.

 

* * *

 

It doesn’t all come back at once. He spends a long time feeling numb and empty and he can only blame himself. Lup is back. His memories are back. He should be feeling like himself.

He doesn’t. It’s hard to care about anything. It’s stupid. He’s stupid. He’s got his sister. He’s got his friends, his crew. He’s got Krav, who is wonderful. And he doesn’t care.

The days following the party, he barely gets out of bed, barely eats. He sleeps a lot.

He feels vaguely guilty. He should be hanging out with Lup. Talking things out with Kravitz. He should be helping Barry. His sister’s partner had said something about getting Lup’s body back and that is definitely something he should be involved in. But he just… can’t.

 

* * *

 

After three days, he tells himself enough is enough. He is going to get up. He is going to help with the clean up. He is going to help Barry get Lup a body for hugging.

He is going to get up. He is going to get up, put his face on and do what needs to be done.

Any moment now.

He’s going to get up in 3..2…1…Now.

Now.

Ok. He’s going to have five more minutes, then. When it gets to 10 o’clock, he’s definitely going to get up.

Hmm. He missed 10 o’clock. It’s two minutes past.

Ok. When it gets to five past then. He will get up. He needs to get up.

 

* * *

 

He doesn’t get up.

 

* * *

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

He knows he should wash his hair. Eat something. Do something. But it's not that easy. 

* * *

 

The others are all busy. Magnus has dedicated his carpentry skills to fixing anything broken in the fight with the Hunger. Merle is busy with his kids, which is still weird by the way. Davenport and Lucretia are organising the repair and rescue efforts through the Bureau. Barry and Lup are off together getting to know each other again. They’d asked him at the party if he was ok with that and he’d said he was. And he was. He was just glad Lup was ok. He could let Barry have her for a while. And Kravitz was off dealing with the backlog of souls caused by the reapers being held by the Hunger for a while before the main attack.

 

* * *

 

His stone of farspeech is on silent. He doesn’t want to talk to anyone. They all want to talk about _feelings_ and he doesn’t have any of those. He ignores the knocks on his door. Why won’t they just leave him alone? He’ll be fine,  he _is_ fine.

He’s just… tired.

 

* * *

 

On the fourth day, Lup floats through his wall.

“Hey bro.”

“Hey Lulu.”

“Want to tell me what’s going on with you? You’ve got people worried.”

“I just… I can’t right now. That’s all.”

And because she’s Lup, because she’s his other half, his heart, because she’s _good_ at the emotion thing, she gets it. Of course she does. She stays with him and talks about all sorts of things. She tells him stories from their childhood, solidifying his mixed up memories. She tells him about Barry and how he cried for hours after the party, so devastated that he couldn’t touch her. She tells him about the umbrastaff, what it was like in there. And he listens to it all and it helps.

He’s still empty. Still numb. But it helps.

“I don’t like who I am without you,” he says.

Eventually she leaves for a while. She has to leave. He knows that. They're not kids anymore, attached at the hip. He’s not sure how long. She says she’ll be back soon, and they both flinch, but she is. Back soon.

* * *

 

She floats through the door and hovers by him.

“You going to answer the door?” she asked. He frowned, and forced himself to pay attention. Hmm. Someone was knocking. He shook his head. “Ok,” she replied, “your funeral.” She turned and shouted back towards the door. “Come on in, guys!”

He has just enough time to think, wait what? And then the door came crashing in, falling to the floor with an almighty thud.

And the crew came piling in. Minus Lucretia. Which felt wrong, even though he didn’t want to see her. Lup waved her hand and transfigured a new door (a little wonky and Magnus was giving her shit over it as they headed over).

“Tres dramatic,” Taako said, and pulled the blanket up over him. He couldn’t bring himself to kick them out. They all piled onto the bed, wrapping themselves around him. And it was familiar in a way that hurt. Back on the Starblaster they had done this a lot. A load of cycles started off like this, piling up together, reassuring themselves that they were all alive and well. Telling each other the stories they’d missed.

It felt strange to have them all around him.

Magnus pressed along his back. Barry sat at the head of the bed and pulled Taako’s head into his lap. Merle perched by his feet, Davenport sat cross legged at Taako’s hip. They all had a hand on him somewhere.

He felt warm.

Then Magnus started talking.

“I must have fixed a thousand houses.” He laughed as he spoke about the difficulties of the past few days. He told them about how Angus was desperate to help, and how he got the boy a little hammer and taught him how to hit a nail and not his thumb. He talked about how happy everyone was, strange in the wake of the disaster. How people were looking out for each other. Looking towards the future. As he began to trail off, Merle took over.

He told them a story about his kids, about how Mookie was growing, how Mavis had decided she wanted to learn magic, about how they wanted to hear all about the century they spent on the ship.

Then Davenport. Then Barry. Then Lup.

Taako didn’t even realise he was crying until Barry swiped a thumb under his eye, wiping away the  tears. No one mentioned it.

It was cleansing somehow, to lie there and let the tears flow.

To let himself feel this.

As they all told him what they’d been up to since he saw them, things slotted into place a little. He felt like he was _feeling._ None of them were blaming him for not being able to just forgive and forget. None of them were blaming him for being empty.

They stayed like that for hours.

* * *

 

As the talk faded, Davenport cleared his throat.

“There are potions, you know. That can even you out. Help you get out of bed in the morning.” And he knew there were potions. He knew Davenport had used them in the past, after they had all watched their world destroyed and was probably using them again now (he also knew Magnus had used them after Julia…). And he thought about it. It would be nice. To be able to get up in the morning. And it worked for them, so maybe it would work for him too.

“I’ll think about it,” he said, his throat dry. He swallowed. “I don’t know though. I think once I get past this bit, I’ll be ok. I think it’s just… a lot.”

Everyone made understanding noises, but he wanted to explain. These were his crew. If anyone understood it would be them.

“Magnus, you were exactly the same. Without our trip, you were still the bumbling hero, Magnus rushes in. And you found Julia. I know you would never give up what happened while we couldn’t remember. And Merle, you were still you. You had _kids.”_ It was weird that Merle had kids, because for a hundred years he had been one of the ‘ship dads’, but at the same time it made perfect sense.  “But I was a such a shit.”

That makes Barry laugh and then apologise for laughing.

“No, Barold, laugh. It’s funny because it’s true. I was such a shit. Without you guys-without you, Lup- I was not a good person.” He sighed and wriggled a little, moving closer to Magnus. “You make me better.”

“Aw, Taako,” Lup said, her voice sweet, “that’s complete bullshit!”

“hey now,” he tried to say, but Lup steamrolled right over him.

“You know it’s bullshit. You know what we’ve been through, I can’t imagine thinking I went through it alone. And you weren’t a shit. You were a Taako, from TV. You showed people how to make amazing food because food is home. Food is life. And then you joined up to a cause and tried to save a world that didn’t deserve. I could go on, but your head is big enough already.” She paused. “You aren’t evil because you not ready to forgive her. You’re not selfish for wishing it never happened.”

There was a chorus of agreement and Taako sighed. It felt like absolution.

* * *

 

When he woke the next morning, they were all still there. It was almost too easy to let Magnus pull him to his feet. To let Merle push him towards the bathroom. To eat the breakfast Barry made under Lup’s supervision. To let Davenport cajole him into laughing.

It felt like home.

 

* * *

 

It wasn’t a perfect fix. He wasn’t ‘healed’ through the magic of cuddles. But the things that seemed so hard in the previous days suddenly didn’t seem nearly so difficult. Mountains became molehills. Or purple worms became baby purple worms, still difficult to defeat, but not nearly so bad as they first seemed.

Especially with a little help from your friends.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is just a little tag on. I couldn't decide whether to end it after the second chapter or write this one. It might get it's own story depending on how it goes. You can pretend the story ends at chapter 2 if you don't like it!

It could stop there. With baby steps being made. With a family coming together to overcome. With people who have been through terrible, terrible things suffering the consequences.

But that is not how life goes.

Life is a gradual crawl upwards after that day. It is hugging his sister. It is cooking. It is nightmares and anxiety and horrible dark emptiness. It is Kravitz looking at him like he is the entire world.

* * *

 

He starts a school. He spends time with Angus, with the crew, with Cary and Killian and everyone who has managed to sneak in to his heart. He hugs his sister. And some days he wake up screaming. And some days fear vibrates under his skin. Some days it is hard to get out of bed. 

And some days he gets a call from Cary, and he goes and sits with Magnus until the man can stop shaking. Other days it is Davenport, calling upset because he can't remember his mother's name or what happened in one cycle or another. Some days Lup comes bursting in and refuses to talk about whatever sent her running to his side. 

They struggle. They live. They carry on. That is what life is. It is hardships and hugs and sorrow and joy and some days he hates it. It is macarons and 30 garlic clove chicken. It is umbrellas. It is music. It is sex and blood and holding hands. It is what it is.  

 

* * *

 

It is Lucretia.

It is a difficult conversation.

She has struggles of her own. She has for a long time. Before she voided their memories. Since that cycle alone. She tells him how scared she was. How alone she felt, even with all of them. She does not ask for forgiveness. Sometimes her hands shake.

He tells her he loves her. He tells her he hates her. He tells her she hurt him. Hurt all of them. He tells her it will never go back to how it was and she will never be his sister. He doesn't tell her how some days he looks in the mirror and hates his face. He doesn't tell her that some days it's a miracle that he is still standing. It wouldn't surprise him if she knows anyway. 

They are both clawing their way up from the blackness. They are both building themselves back into people. They understand each other and that hurts worse than anything else.

It is not enough, but it will do.

It is life and it goes on and so do they. 

 

* * *

 


End file.
